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The connected consumer

Understanding how consumers behave before they make a purchasing decision is invaluable knowledge. In its latest quarterly report Eccomplished looks at the information and inspiration people seek out in order to reach buying decisions.Consumers look for two broad types of input to answer their key questions. They look to their 'information influencers' for guidance about how a product works, and their 'inspiration influencers' for questions about personal taste.Eccomplished discovered that over half (54%) of consumers visited an online marketplace and 31% read online reviews when making purchasing choices. Both of these options push recommendations from family and friends into third place. 39% of respondents would complete an online rating after a purchase and 35% state they would recommend items to family and friends.However, the report suggests that social media tools are not yet having a significant impact on purchasing decisions. Only 10% of people said they would ‘follow' or ‘like' a brand on a social network while 1% said that their decision had been informed by a recommendation on a social network.